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The Dynix Automated Library System was purchased by the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea's Libraries and Arts Service in 1987 to replace its existing Plessey circulation system. This paper briefly describes the implementation and the aspects of Dynix which made it particularly attractive to Kensington, as well as reviewing the project one year after circulation went live at the first branch. The system is now in use at all service points in the Borough, that is six fixed sites and one mobile library.

This paper provides an overview of automation at Glasgow College Library since the 1970s when a subject index was prepared using punched cards. The Dynix library system was purchased in 1988. Details are given of how retrospective cataloguing was carried out using OCLC's RETROCON service and how OCLC MARC records are downloaded into the catalogue database in the Dynix system. An example is included of a search using the OPAC subject index.

The article aims at examining the ethical limits and risks of servant leadership. During the Second World War, the German army officer Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg is a loyal servant to his nation and homeland. But when he learns about the Nazis’ mass murders and crimes, he begins to have doubts about whom he should serve. Being confronted with numerous moral dilemmas, he finally decides to join a resistance group. Of course, Stauffenberg's situation as colonel and leader was an extreme case. Time and again, however, managers and leaders are faced with similar dilemmas. Indeed, the current COVID-19-crisis shows that even today’s leaders are repeatedly faced with almost insoluble dilemmas. The recent literature about ethics and leadership suggests a philosophy which is almost portrayed as a panacea to any ethical issues: servant leadership (SL). This study, however, questions the commonly held view that SL is always ethical. The purpose of our historical case study is twofold. First, this study explores the ethical challenges Stauffenberg (and other officers) faced and how they dealt with them. Second, this study elaborates on what responses (if any) SL would provide to these challenges.

The applied method is a historical case study, in which the authors draw on a plethora of secondary literature, including books, reports, and articles.

By analyzing the historical case of “Operation Valkyrie,” this study elaborated and identified risks and limitations of SL and pointed out ways to address these risks. In particular, SL poses risks in the case of a too narrow understanding of the term “service.”

While other leadership styles, e.g. transformational leadership or charismatic leadership, have been extensively studied with regard to ethical risks, in the case of SL possible risks and limitations are still largely unexplored.